


i don't want to die without any scars

by birdcagereligion (ckasjfbfksbj)



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-03
Updated: 2012-11-03
Packaged: 2017-11-17 16:02:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/553355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ckasjfbfksbj/pseuds/birdcagereligion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She understands.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i don't want to die without any scars

“This one,” he whispers, his lips brushing against her skin, sending shivers down her spine, “is my favorite.”  
She scoffs and turns onto her back, moving him with her. “You have a favorite scar?”  
“I love all your scars.” He grins and bites softly on her pale flesh.  
“But this one is a personal favorite.” Without a word on her part, he continues. “You got it on our first mission together, while I was too busy watching you to notice the sniper with his sight on me and you had to save my dumb ass.” He keeps talking, explaining to her exactly what she looked like—The scariest fucking thing I have ever seen, a true angel of death—but she isn’t listening.  
I love him,she thinks to herself suddenly, as she watches him tell his story, in that special way of his—using his hands to much, waving them in the air, enunciating his words with a jab of his finger. He tells it as if she hadn’t been there, as if she isn’t the one who can recall the burn of hot metal tearing into her flesh, the blood pooling from the wound and the immense hatred she had felt for Clint that day.  
I love him, she thinks again, and this time it registers. The true meaning of the words.  
I love him, and I would take that bullet a thousand times more if it meant just one more night like this. Just one more night.  
He catches her staring and stops talking; she wants to tell him to keep talking, to keep saying anything at all, just keep talking, but she doesn’t, she can’t, her breath is caught in her throat.  
“Tasha?”   
I love him I love him I love him.   
The thought resounds in her head, trapped, echoing and repeating itself over and over, until she can’t bear it, they start slipping out of her mouth—before another thought over takes her mind suddenly, a dark and disturbing image of her laying her heart before him and he laughs.  
“Natasha?”  
She looks at him and sees the concern in his eyes, slowly spreading across his face. Leaning forward, she surprises the both of them, and kisses him. The kiss is hard and primal, coming from somewhere deep within her, somewhere she has never seen before.  
He pulls away, much too soon for her liking, red faced and breathless.  
“Are you alright?” He asks after a moment, in a rare moment of complete seriousness.  
“You really are an idiot,” she says after a moment. His face goes blank, before he laughs suddenly, his face brightening, and she smiles at him.  
“Some things never change.” He lies down and pulls her on top of him, his fingers pressed lightly over the raised skin on her stomach.  
“Tell me your other favorite scars,” she says suddenly, whispering into the darkness. He laughs and begins.  
“This one, right here, I remember when you got it. Hydra station going after Grim Reaper…”  
-  
Later that night, as she lies on his chest and starts to doze off, listening to his steady heartbeat and his gentle snores filling the air, she vows to herself that in the morning she’ll tell him, she’ll tell him everything.  
“I love you,” she whispers, and the words feel right.  
-  
She never tells him.  
-  
Two weeks later, in the rush and excitement of victory, both high on adrenaline, Steve kisses her.  
Clint silently watches.  
-  
The next day, Clint is gone, and no one, not even her, knows where he is.  
-  
A year later, after her final search, a broken arrow arrives in the mail.  
No one understands what it means, if Clint has been captured of left of his own accord, but Fury takes it as a letter or resignation.  
-  
She understands.


End file.
